Montagu House

Montagu House stood in Great Russell Street, Bloomsbury, during the late 17th century. It was built for Ralph Montagu, later the first Duke of Montagu, on land that then bordered open fields. The first house was designed by Robert Hooke and completed in 1679. It featured a central block with two service wings around a large courtyard. Interior murals were painted by Antonio Verrio, with further work by Jacques Rousseau. A fire in 1686 destroyed the house, but it was rebuilt on the same site. The second Montagu House became the grandest private residence in London during the 1680s and 1690s. It was designed by the French architect Pierre Puget and had seventeen bays along the main façade. The interior followed French planning, with state apartments leading from a central saloon. Horace Walpole admired the interiors, comparing them to those at Boughton House. The house remained a landmark in Bloomsbury until the British Museum acquired it in 1759. The British Museum occupied Montagu House until the 1840s, when it was demolished for a larger building. The Weekly Register once criticised the house as an example of misplaced grandeur. Today, no trace of Montagu House remains above ground. Its legacy lives on in literary works such as Neal Stephenson’s Baroque Cycle. The site now lies beneath the British Museum’s grand façade, marking the beginning of one of the world’s great public collections.